Was Obama rattled by developing donor scandal story?

Are Americans Going To Standby and Give Obama A Pass Like 2008?-You Decide:

Posted on The Washington Examiner-On October 4, 2012:

“President Obama’s reelection campaign, rattled by his Wednesday night debate performance, could be in for even worse news. According to knowledgeable sources, a national magazine and a national web site are preparing a blockbuster donor scandal story.

Sources told Secrets that the Obama campaign has been trying to block the story. But a key source said it plans to publish the story Friday or, more likely, Monday.

According to the sources, a taxpayer watchdog group conducted a nine-month investigation into presidential and congressional fundraising and has uncovered thousands of cases of credit card solicitations and donations to Obama and Capitol Hill, allegedly from unsecure accounts, and many from overseas. That might be a violation of federal election laws.

The Obama campaign has received hundreds of millions in small dollar donations, many via credit card donations through their website. On Thursday, the campaign announced a record September donor haul of $150 million.

At the end of the 2008 presidential campaign, the Obama-Biden effort was hit with a similar scandal. At the time, the Washington Post reported that the Obama campaign let donors use “largely untraceable prepaid credit cards that could potentially be used to evade limits on how much an individual is legally allowed to give or to mask a contributor’s identity.”

“The Internet and social media sites like Facebook and Twitter have democratized elections, made the world more interconnected, and allowed the velocity of information to be faster than ever before.

But an extensive eight-month investigation by the Government Accountability Institute (GAI) released on Monday found these same forces can also be the greatest threat to America’s sovereignty (visit campaignfundingrisks.com to download the full report). These technologies allow foreign donors to anonymously circumvent U.S. campaign finance laws and directly influence elections by donating repeatedly to candidates.

The 108-page GAI report found nearly half of Congress, both political parties and presidential candidates, and third-party fundraising groups that funnel money to political parties and candidates were vulnerable to fraudulent and foreign donations. This is a bipartisan problem potentially impacting all levels of government, as those whose organizations were found to have been vulnerable include President Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), the Democratic National Committee (DNC), the Republican National Committee (RNC), and third-party groups like ActBlue, which funnels money to progressive politicians.

And the report found that the website Obama.com, which is not owned by President Barack Obama’s campaign but redirects to the campaign’s official donation page, may make the Obama campaign the most susceptible to illicit foreign donations. Obama.com is connected to an Obama campaign bundler, Robert Roche, who is from Chicago but now lives and co-founded a corporation in China. Roche has direct ties to China’s state-owned banking industry.

Peter Schweizer, president of GAI, told Breitbart News the ease with which foreigners could donate to American candidates puts America’s sovereignty in peril.

Schweizer said he had initially thought “we would find some bloggers overseas with motivation to support a presidential candidate encouraging people to make donations,” but he was “very surprised” by the study’s findings, including how easy it was for foreigners to use “robo-donation” programs that allow foreigners to potentially make thousands of small-dollar, fraudulent and automated donations to candidates.

Schweizer said he “never thought” the GAI would find mysterious redirect sites like Obama.com and was “surprised how little security is required to receive online donations.”

“We are basically trusting political consultants and fundraisers to do the right thing when no one is looking,” Schweizer said.

The report found nearly half of Congress was vulnerable to fraudulent and foreign directions. Of the 446 House and Senate members who have an online donation page, 47.3% do not require the Card Verification Value (CVV), which is the three or four-digit security code on the back of credit cards, for internet donations. Those in Congress who are vulnerable to foreign donations can be seen at www.CampaignFundingRisks.com.

And the Obama campaign seems to be the most content with the “lax security.”

The FEC requires campaigns to make their “best efforts” to collect identifying information on all contributors who donate more than $50.30 and even more specific information, such as the donor’s occupation and employer, for donations over $200.

As the report notes, donations less than $50, though, fall under the “Pass-the-Hat” rule, which means campaigns can report all such donations under a lump sum and do not have to make their “best efforts” to collecting information on these small-dollar donors.

Because foreigners can exploit the “Pass-the-Hat” rule, the report found that “any campaign not using these industry-standard security tools is increasing its costs and unnecessarily increasing the risk of at least two types of potential fraud”:

The Fraudulent High Dollar Donor(s): –the fraudulent high dollar donor is politically motivated and is seeking to avoid detection by making numerous donations below the $200 dollar threshold, over which their donation must be identified; they may seek to exceed campaign donation limits.

The Unintentional Fraudster –a foreign national who is unaware of U.S. election laws but sympathetic to the campaign. Such an individual can easily end up on a campaign donation page. Given that a number of campaigns list the U.S. donation laws in an inconspicuous place on the “donate” page, it is easy to see how illegal donations can be made with no malicious intent.

And the Obama campaign is most vulnerable to both types of fraudsters.

For example, the study found “the Obama campaign regularly and aggressively posts solicitations for donations and campaign memorabilia on Facebook,” and “the campaign does not make clear in these postings that only U.S. citizens or permanent residents are allowed to contribute.” Fundraising solicitations from the Obama campaign have gone out to foreigners, asking them to contribute in amounts of less than $200. Similar solicitations have been posted in Arabic, Taiwanese, and Chinese on Facebook and on Middle Eastern and Asian websites.

Even though the Obama campaign is touted for its technological sophistication and sites run by top Obama technology advisers use the “CVV” feature, the Obama campaign itself does not use the “CVV” feature on its donation pages—even though it does use the feature on the merchandise pages where it sells campaign merchandise.

This means someone who donates $2,500 to the campaign online has to go through less security than someone who goes online to buy an Obama campaign mug.

“This creates a security risk that is compounded by the considerable foreign interest in President Obama’s political history, personal story, and views,” the report notes.

And according to the study, BarackObama.com, the campaign’s main website, receives approximately 43% of its traffic from foreign IP addresses.

In addition, popular websites touting Obama’s campaign and linking to its donation page have been found in places like China, Azerbaijan, Vietnam, the Netherlands, Italy, Japan, Norway, Egypt, Hong Kong, and South Korea.

The report notes that not using the CVV feature “is quite possibly costing the campaign millions of dollars in additional fees,” but the campaign is still not using it. Perhaps this is so because the Obama campaign has benefited from donations slipping through the cracks in the past.

In 2008, the report discovered that an individual using the name “Doodad Pro” made at least 791 contributions totaling $19,065 to the Obama campaign while others named “Good Will,” “Test Person” from “Some Place, UT,” “gjtjtjtjtjtjr, AP,” and “QWERTTYYU” also contributed to the campaign.

The most interesting—or suspicious—site is Obama.com, which the campaign strangely does not own. According to the report, nearly 68% of internet traffic to Obama.com comes from foreign locations. And the website is connected to Robert Roche, who lives in China and co-founded a Chinese company called Acorn International. Roche, the report found, made 19 visits to the White House since 2009, including being seated at the head table during a State dinner with Chinese president Hu Jintao in 2011.

Unlike the Obama campaign, the Romney campaign website uses the “CVV” feature but it is not without vulnerabilities.

For instance, Romney’s campaign also has Facebook and Twitter accounts in Arabic that give off the impression they are associated with the Romney campaign. These accounts link to the Romney campaign’s page and are presumably for a foreign audience.

In addition, the report found some of Romney’s top bundlers, like Akin Gump’s Tom Loeffler, have lobbied for foreign governments like Saudi Arabia.

Since 1980, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos, the Chinese government, powerful Indonesian families, foreign criminal gangs, and the Turkish government have tried to influence American officials through campaign donations.

Turkish government officials, the report notes, once bragged about sending hundreds of thousands of dollars in “un-itemized contributions” to then Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert’s campaign between 1996 and 2000 and the government of Pakistan has shuttled campaign donations through intermediaries to presidential candidates and members of Congress who sat on the Foreign Affairs Committee, such as Congressman Dan Burton.

With the internet, foreigners can now attempt to influence American officials anonymously and conveniently—with the click of a mouse.

According to the study, influential members of Congress had websites that made them vulnerable to illicit foreign donations. For instance, Rep. Ilena Ros-Lehtinen, Chairman of the House International Affairs Committee, had a campaign website that prior to May 1, 2012 did not require the CVV to contribute to her campaign. Though there was no evidence of illicit campaign contributions, her website was vulnerable to them.

The study also found that during Sen. Marco Rubio’s 2010 senate run, Rubio’s campaign did not require the CVV from his online contributors and foreign websites, including many in South America, often featured videos that urged viewers to “donate” to Rubio’s campaign. One potential reason for Rubio’s popularity abroad on websites was the idea of “ethnic solidarity” among Hispanics willing to support a rising star of the same heritage.

The report also noted foreigners can also donate to third-party organizations on both sides of the aisle that funnel money to political candidates.

The GAI study acknowledged “by design, social media’s expansive and viral nature disseminates information, ideas, and causes,” and as a result, “social media is difficult to control, and indeed should not be controlled.”

“Campaigns need to be aware that the age of social media is an age where donation requests go viral, reaching the furthest corners of the world,” the report notes. “Failure to employ industry standard security and transparent accountability is almost an invitation to foreign money to inject itself into federal campaigns.”

The United States has laws against foreign campaign donations to protect its sovereignty and, in January 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously upheld these laws banning foreign contributions were constitutional.

The GAI report recommends election officials:

Integrate safeguards to limit the solicitation of money from foreigners by requiring donors with foreign IP addresses to provide proof of U.S. citizenship before they can proceed to the donate page

Immediately require campaigns to use industry-standard anti-fraud security technologies including, but not limited to, the Card Verification Value (CVV) and a rigorous Address Verification System (AVS)

Immediately require all campaigns to retain and disclose identifying information on all online campaign contributions, including those falling under the $200 nondisclosure threshold currently allowed under federal law

Address the threat of “Robo-Donations”: The absence of industry-standard anti-fraud credit card security features render campaigns more vulnerable to so-called “robo-donations.” Robo-donations are large numbers of small, automated donations made through the Internet to evade FEC reporting requirements.

Schweizer, president of GAI, put a particular emphasis on the “robo-donations” that “can literally make a thousand small contributions under different names to fall below the disclosure thresholds.”

These “robo-donations” essentially allow foreigners to threaten America’s sovereignty and potentially undermine its elections, which is why Schweizer said it is “absolutely essential” to mandate more disclosure and credit card security for campaign donations.

“Amazon.com uses more credit card security for online book purchases than many federal candidates accepting $2,000 campaign donations via credit card,” Schweizer said. “To protect the integrity of U.S. elections, that must change.”

Is the Obama campaign or a surrogate accepting foreign donations in violation of federal election laws?

(Oct. 8, 2012) — Following breaking news from the Government Accountability Institute (GAI) that the Obama campaign is not vetting donors by requiring the CVV code from the back of the credit card through the website Obama.com, The Post & Email contacted the local office of the Secret Service.

Although it was 10:15 p.m. EDT, there was a means by which to leave a voice mail with the local Secret Service Field Office, which we did, explaining the findings of Peter Schweizer and Stephen K. Bannon.

Bannon and Schweizer reported that the Romney campaign has enacted a requirement for the credit card donor’s CVV code. However, they report that Romney would not disclose the names of his bundlers, or fundraisers, and have investigated and published the names of 34 of them through The Daily Beast.

We then called the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) and reached a live person at the after-hours number for media inquiries. The person answered the call with “Hello,” perhaps due to the time of night. After we described the news broken today by the Government Accountability Institute claiming that the Obama campaign is potentially soliciting donors and receiving donations from all over the world in violation of federal election laws, we asked the representative which actions, if any, the FEC would be taking. The response was “No comment.”

We asked if the person could direct us to contact any other agency about the potential for credit card fraud and foreign donations to the Obama campaign, and the woman said, “Well, no, not at this time of night.” She said if we were to call back in the morning, someone “might direct us to rules and regulations,” but that other than that, they had “no comment.”

In 2008, it was suspected that the Obama campaign took in a large amount of cash from foreigners. Obama himself is suspected of being a foreigner, and his long-form birth certificate and Selective Service registration form have been deemed forgeries by a law enforcement investigation.

On Fox News’s “Hannity” show at 10:00 p.m. EDT, Schweizer and Bannon stated that Obama.com is owned by a private individual living in China and has been redirecting visitors to a donation page which does not verify the person’s credit card information. They also asserted that the Obama campaign is “soliciting” donations in the amount of $190, just under the $200 amount which requires verification of the donor. Obama.com at first appears to be a campaign website but solicits donations on its main page rather than disseminating information about Obama and Biden, both of whose names appear at the top and bottom of the site with the round Obama logo in between. The two investigators told Fox & Friends on Monday morning that the Obama campaign is receiving “43% international traffic” with the purpose of soliciting donations.

At the bottom of Obama.com, the following appears:

By submitting the form above you confirm that the following statements are true and accurate:

I am a United States citizen or a lawfully admitted permanent resident of the United States.

This contribution is not made from the general treasury funds of a corporation, labor organization or national bank.

This contribution is not made from the treasury of an entity or person who is a federal contractor.

This contribution is not made from the funds of a political action committee.

This contribution is not made from the funds of an individual registered as a federal lobbyist or a foreign agent, or an entity that is a federally registered lobbying firm or foreign agent.

I am not a minor under the age of 16.

The funds I am donating are not being provided to me by another person or entity for the purpose of making this contribution.

Obama is quoted in the GAI report as having said in 2010, “I don’t think elections should be bankrolled by America’s most powerful interests, and worse, by foreign entities.”

The GAI found that 47.3% of members of Congress do not use the CVV code to verify donations.

Schweizer and Bannon have established a website specifically dealing with online campaign donations featuring coverage of the breaking news today. Reports of government corruption can also be submitted through the GAI’s home page.”

There is a simple way to screen out fraudulent donations which the Romney campaign is using the McCain’s campaign used in 2008. Why doesn’t the Obama campaign make use of it?

(Oct. 8, 2012) — The Obama campaign is reporting that it raised a record $181 million in the month of September alone. According to campaign FEC filings for September, the money came from 1.8 million individual donors, many overseas, and over 500,000 of whom had never donated before.

Did YOU donate to Obama? You might have, just follow the trail… The same thing happened in September of 2008. We later learned that most of that huge cash infusion came from foreign countries, in small denominations, just like September 2012, averaging $53 each from millions of undisclosed donors, most of them abroad.

There are Federal Laws making it “illegal” to accept “foreign campaign contributions,” yet Obama just took in almost $200 million, most of it from overseas donors. The FEC must immediately investigate the source of these overseas funds.

The neat part is who those “first time donors” are… it is YOU. And it is YOU who must demand that the FEC and Secret Service immediately investigate the massive overseas funds pouring into the Obama campaign.

“Campaigns are not required to disclose donations from individuals who gave less than $200 in a campaign cycle unless the campaign is audited. Furthermore, campaigns do not even need to keep records of those who gave less than $50. Presidential candidates are raising large amounts of money that fall under the $200 threshold and audits are rare unless a campaign accepts federal matching funds. To this date (September 26, 2012), the Romney campaign has raised $58,456,968 and the Obama campaign has raised $271,327,755 in contributions under $200 for the 2012 campaign cycle. In the 2008 presidential elections, the Obama campaign raised $335,139,233 in donations under $200.”

Given the state-of-the art digital sophistication of the President’s re-election campaign—including social media, micro-targeting and data-mining—its online donation system contains at least three major security vulnerabilities:

1. The absence of the industry-standard CVV and unknown use of AVS anti-fraud security for online credit card donations

2. The presence of a branded, major third party-owned website (Obama.com) redirects its 68% foreign traffic to a campaign donation page

3. Active foreign solicitation using indiscriminate email solicitations and exposure to social media

Specifically:Obama Campaign Lacks the Industry-Standard Level Of Credit Card Security For Donations, But Uses It For Merchandise Purchases: To purchase Obama campaign merchandise, the campaign requires buyers to enter their credit card CVV security code, but does not require the credit card security code to be entered when making an online campaign donation (see page 61). By GAI’s estimates, the Obama campaign’s failure to utilize industry-standard protections potentially costs the campaign millions in extra processing fees. (with purpose)

The BIG Picture is Massive Fraud

There are reasons why the Obama campaign would use CVV code security technology for merchandising. In short, the CVV code on the back of your credit or debit card is there to ensure that the individual using the card is you, or someone authorized by you to use the card.

Most Credit Card fraud does not happen with a stolen card, but rather a stolen card number. Because the fraudster does not actually possess the card, but only the card number and expiration date for the card, they will not have the CVV code on the back of the card in most cases.

When the campaign is selling and shipping merchandise, they use CVV code technology to secure each transaction before shipping merchandise.

But when nothing is being shipped, as in the case of campaign donations, they have CVV code technology turned off. Why? Because, the transactions coming from overseas on stolen card numbers, will not have the CVV code. They also won’t have AVS information, which the Obama campaign also turned off on its donations account. They are stolen card numbers, most of them from Americans.

With these security functions turned on, the system would DECLINE transactions as “fraudulent” if they were missing a matching CVV code. So, to allow “fraudulent” donations on stolen card numbers, they would have to turn off the CVV security function, thereby allowing the “fraudulent” transactions to APPROVE without any CVV code match.

This raises three obvious questions?

Who are these individual donors? (Including via bundlers?)

Why are we allowing foreign donations from overseas?

How many of those donations are made on stolen U.S. card numbers?

Only a full scale investigation into the massive donations from September 2012 (and 2008) can answer these and other questions. However, what we already know is this…

Obama is not supposed to accept any foreign campaign donations, but he is.

The Obama campaign is familiar with and using CVV code technology on merchandise, but not on campaign donations.

Without the CVV code, fraudulent donations can be made with stolen card numbers and they are.

The CVV code technology was intentionally turned off for Obama donations only.

The Secret Service is responsible for investigating and prosecuting Credit Card Fraud.

The Secret Service must immediately investigate the huge sums pouring into the Obama campaign from overseas donors, looking closely at the campaigns misuse of CVV code technology to open the flood gates for fraudulent transactions.

The Obama Campaign used these same tactics in 2008, for more than $200 million in foreign unsecure donations from undisclosed donors.

Because they are committing fraud in small denominations, $25-$50 each, most American cardholders won’t even notice the charge on their statement. Even if they do notice on their next billing statement and issue a chargeback, it won’t be until after the election is over.

Meanwhile, Obama can take in hundreds of millions in foreign fraudulent transactions billed to stolen U.S. card numbers and use those funds to win re-election. By the time people figure out they donated to Obama when their statement arrives, the election will be over.

Whether or not the average reader can grasps the gravity of this fraud or not, I can assure you that the Secret Service and F.B.I. fully understand. They know exactly why someone would turn off these standard security features. They know that it represents an intentional opening of the floodgates for fraudulent online donations.

What the people need to know is what these Law Enforcement groups are going to do about it and if they are going to do it, before another election is stolen by fraud?

“Minutes after Newsweek published a story on the threat of illegal foreign and fraudulent online campaign donations late Monday afternoon, the Obama campaign struck back hard with a response smearing one of the article’s authors and offered an anemic defense of its online fundraising operations.

Earlier today, Breitbart News and myriad news agencies reported on a new 108-page investigation conducted by the Government Accountability Institute (GAI) which examines the online donation systems of the entire U.S. Congress and the two presidential candidates. The report found that 47.3% of all House and Senate donation websites do not require online donors to enter their credit card security code (officially known as a CVV, or Card Verification Value), which leaves them vulnerable to foreign and fraudulent contributions.

Governor Mitt Romney’s website requires donors to enter a credit card security code, while President Barack Obama’s does not. The GAI report also revealed that Obama.com is not owned by the president’s campaign but rather by Robert Roche, an American businessman and top Obama fundraiser living in Shanghai, China, whose company has ties to the Chinese government.

Within hours of a Newsweek article on the report’s release, the Obama campaign issued a dismissive response. The Obama campaign’s rapid-fire attack against the report did not mention Robert Roche, Obama.com, the Obama campaign’s failure to require donors to enter their CVV code, or the report’s finding that 68% of the traffic going to Obama.com originates from foreign locations.

Instead, the Obama campaign sought to dismiss report’s findings by calling the group’s president, Peter Schweizer, a “right-wing activist” who previously worked for Governor Sarah Palin.

The Obama campaign’s attempt to deflect attention away from GAI’s findings, however, is undercut by the fact that Mr. Schweizer has been a consistent critic of Gov. Romney’s refusal to release the names of his fundraising bundlers. What’s more, President Obama championed and signed into law the STOCK Act banning insider trading—an effort sparked by Peter Schweizer’s insider trading expose featured on CBS’s 60 Minutes that placed GOP Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee Rep. Spencer Bachus (R-AL) under intense scrutiny for possible insider trading.

“Protecting U.S. elections from illegal foreign donations is an effort behind which all Americans can unite,” said Mr. Schweizer in an interview with Breitbart News. “As the GAI report demonstrates, lax and antiquated Federal Election Commission (FEC) laws are woefully out of step with the technological realities of today’s digital campaigns.”

Note: The following articles and/or blog posts and website reveal the George Soros connection, to include: 1) who ran cover for Obama's Islamic background during the 2008 Presidential election campaign; 2) his connection to President Obama; and 3) his and President Obama's shared agendas-You Decide:

Note: My following blog posts contain numerous articles and/or blog posts and videos that reveal: 1) the live presentation by Joel Gilbert, his DVD Film titled "Dreams From My Real Father," along with the newly released film titled "The Unvetted”; the Islamic infiltration inside our government armed with our secrets, to include the President's secret link to Hamas; the Islamic infiltration inside our military; the Communist infiltration inside our government, to Include President Obama's secret link to Communists; the George Soros connection, to include the shared agendas of George Soros and the President; and 3) the President's secret CIA connection, along with the disastrous results of these infiltrations, links and connections-You Decide:

Letter to Congressman Allen West Regarding Alleged Illegal Credit Card Solicitations and Donations To President and Capitol Hill From Un-Secure Overseas Accounts!-Posted on We The People USA-By Jake Martinez-On October 8, 2012:

Letter To NM U.S. Senator Udall Regarding Alleged Illegal Credit Card Solicitations and Donations To President and Capitol Hill From Un-Secure Overseas Accounts!-Posted on We The People USA-By Jake Martinez-On October 8, 2012:

Note: If you have a problem viewing any of the listed blog posts, please copy website and paste it on your browser. Sure seems like any subject matter that may be considered controversial by this administration is being censored-What happened to free speech?-You Decide.

Section One: Congress shall make and the President shall sign a Balanced Federal Budget every year and before the beginning of the ensuing fiscal year. In the event Congress and the President fail to make said…